


Long Time Coming

by Anarchyinplasma



Series: Life and Times of a Risen [9]
Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: F/F, Found Family, I think these are a bit AU by now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:08:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25970341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anarchyinplasma/pseuds/Anarchyinplasma
Summary: With the Darkness looming on the Horizon, Arcturus reunites with his oldest friends.
Relationships: Tallulah Fairwind/Raven Fairwind
Series: Life and Times of a Risen [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/643955





	Long Time Coming

"You tried to make sure we never set eyes on a Dreg, in the name of 'keeping us safe'"  
Arcturus ground his teeth beneath his helmet.  
"Please be quiet, Hawthorne."  
“I’m just sayi-” the comm clicks off and Arcturus sighs as he moves another massive Venusian leaf out of his way.  
“Thank you” he mutters to his ghost.  
Callahan doesn’t say anything, but he’s always been the silent type (especially on trips like these), and that suits Arcturus just fine, so he just steps over the Fallen’s corpse and keeps walking.

He’s been out here for a few weeks now, as soon as the pyramids had appeared every single light-bearing Human Exo or Awoken had been pulled from the previous mission regime and sent on active assignment as the City moved to war footing. Arcturus’ current priority objective is reconnaissance and observation, just like every other Nightstalker the Vanguard can get their hands on, they’re all over the system right now, hundreds of Hunters everywhere they can possibly be getting every single bit of information they can.

He’s on Venus because there’s no pyramid here, and he knows that makes the commander very nervous, as much as commander Stonewall Zavala won’t ever show it; so Arcturus keeps an eye on the No Respect For Our Elder comm channel at all times, they’re on active combat duty, Io for Stratos, Mercury for Rydiah and Copperwing. They keep each-other updated as much as they can, though Arcturus is operating under Shadowsmith protocols and can’t talk about everything, he tells them what’s relevant, and he trusts his team to read between the lines.

He stops at a muddy bank and pulls his rifle over his shoulder, crouched on one knee and propping the barrel in a small crevasse to keep his sight steady. He knows this Vex gate, he’s been here hundreds of times, and they don’t seem different today, the same movement patterns, the same instruments, the same scanning and pausing and weird movements. He still watches, cataloguing it all before he moves on.

This is his routine now, observe, catalogue, repeat. He hasn’t even fired a dusk arrow since he got here. His HUD blinks and updates with another cross referenced data set from his ship in low orbit. There’s a long stretch to his south he needs to have a look at. The terrain is an issue though, he’s on the edge of a mile high cliff with Vex everywhere. Walking around is feasible, but it’s slow and he can’t see the floor of the valley that way, so it’s time to get creative.

Arcturus stows his rifle and moves slowly along the artificial wall to the cliff’s edge, he steps over puddles as he moves in a crouch, relaxed but ready to turn to smoke in an instant if he’s caught in a glowing red optic. Carefully he avoids placing his feet on any dead twigs or blooming plants, the Vex have a strange fascination with Flora, perhaps not surprising given what he’s seen of the Black Garden; but just another thing to be wary of. The edge of the cliff is sheer and Arcturus stifles a groan as he gets his first look down the side; crouched in Venus shrubbery less than five metres from some thin-limbed bronze machine with a searching red eye.  
“You can walk around” his ghost reminds him, though Callahan knows as well as Arcturus does that given the timescale their data is working on that will put them way behind schedule.  
“Not really,” Arcturus responds quietly, feeling his light hum in his veins as he slows his breathing and relaxes fully into the rhythm of the void, “down you go.”

Callahan emerges from the space above his hand and speeds down the cliff like a silver musket ball, Arcturus waits a good minute and a half before he hears his ghost’s voice in his ear.  
“You’re going to make a mess.”  
“No real way around it” the Hunter replies; and lets himself drop off the cliff.

It’s a hell of a long fall, Arcturus thinks as he speeds downwards, hoping he doesn’t hit any stubborn tree branches as the altimeter on his HUD jumps forwards and goes into a frenzy as his freefall hits terminal velocity. He relaxes into the rhythm of his light, feeling that cold comforting talon that sleeps in his veins moments before the impact comes and his world is pure pain for a brief moment before darkness claims him.

He gets up a second later, stretching a kink out of his back and half-admiring the crater he left in the ground.  
“Bloody hell” he grunts as he climbs up the side of the messy hole he’s just made; “I hate that trick."  
“I told you that you could walk around” Callahan tells him and Arcturus rolls his eyes.  
“You know as well as I do that Raven is covering the path we’d need anyway, and it would cost time we don’t really have.” His ghost concedes that point with silence, and Arcturus trudges on.

By the time they make it up the other (thankfully less steep) side of the valley and are out of the densest shade of the gigantic trees the weather has gotten worse, and the storm overhead is so bad that Arcturus resorts to radar beacons so the Lance in orbit can correctly triangulate his data when the clouds clear.

A few hours later, the storm is barely any better but at least he’s nearing the end of his sector. A message pops up in his visor from the single-beam channel for use in large scale behind enemy lines operations like this as he nears his designated rest point.

>I HAVE THE FIRE BURNING ALREADY IF YOU WANT TO DROP IN ON US BEFORE YOUR FINAL SECTOR - RF

Raven must be ahead of them, Arcturus realises as Callahan sends back another response over single-beam.

>SOUNDS FANTASTIC, US? - A

The “us” is a strange choice of words to Arcturus, the Hunters on planet are spread thin and expected to cover a lot of ground between them. But Raven’s reply provides an answer that gives Arcturus a rather pleasant surprise.

>LULLY - RF

If Tallulah is here as well, then they’re closer to the equator than Arcturus realised, and the group in the southern hemisphere must have had an easier time of it than those in the north.

>THEY’VE WORKED FAST, WHAT DIRECTION DO I WALK IN? - A  
>SE, ETA 45M - RF  
>MAKE IT 50M, RADAR COVER - A  
>SOLID - RF

Fifty minutes later, after a detour to make sure his beacons are correctly placed, Arcturus pushes a bush aside and greets Tallulah and Raven with a grin.  
“Are we done then?” he asks Tallulah, sitting next to the fire on a convenient rock.  
“Mostly we are” she tells him, and her ghost projects a near fully complete satellite mask of Venus with corroborating ground mappings from every one of the many Hunters on the task.  
“Only a couple to go way down that-a-way” Raven adds, jerking a thumb over her shoulder in the direction of the southernmost edge of the densest jungle on the planet. Arcturus’ smile widens and fishes his self-heating canteen out to pass some tea around as he pulls his helmet off and pulls his cloak back up over his head.

“Any trouble for you?” he asks once he gets it back, and Raven nods.  
“I ran into Cabal stragglers,” she makes a disgusted noise in the back of her throat, “they’re cutting down acres and acres, Traveller alone knows why, they must know their base here is failing”. She shifts closer to Tallulah and leans her head on her shoulder, armour clinking awkwardly against the former Hunter Vanguard. Tallulah laces their fingers together expertly despite the heavy gloves.  
“I didn’t get any,” she says, pulling her hood further forward as it threatens to slide off her head and leave her blonde hair exposed to the spotting rain, “killed a few Fallen on my way through but no muss and no fuss. Only Vanguard to successfully retire so I’m pretty good.” She mock-preens and Raven laughs.  
“You got off on handing the Dare to Andal on a technicality and you know it.”  
“I did not! He took it fair…”

Arcturus watches as the two long-standing Hunters fade into their own little world with a bittersweet smile, he takes a drink as they argue, hair falling out of their hoods and into each other’s faces as they turn head to head and get animated about Tallulah’s retirement. His bittersweet nostalgia turns to outright amusement as they get closer and closer, becoming substantially quieter when Tallulah crosses the final centimetre of space and sticks her tongue into Raven’s mouth.

Arcturus lets them have their moment, before he clears his throat as loudly as he can, and when Tallulah raises her middle finger at him before her hands go back to Raven’s neck, he kicks her in the shin.

They break apart with an “OW!” and Arcturus laughs.  
“Things I do not need to see.” He gestures at them both and Raven moves into Tallulah’s lap and tucks her head underneath her wife’s chin with a huff.  
“Jealous?”  
“Of your ability to turn any argument no matter how minor into a make-out session?” he replies, snarky. “Not really, no.” Tallulah grins at him over Raven’s head as she wraps her arms around the shorter Hunter’s waist.  
“Jealous that I get to kiss this pretty face?” she tries for serious but can’t hold in the laughter and Raven giggles in her arms.  
“Not my type,” Arcturus says drily, “and we’re far too close, you wouldn’t have even thought about kissing Andal.” The brief look of horror on both of their faces makes him chuckle, until Raven adds in a deadpan  
“Andal might have thought about making out with Andal”

The three of them fall over themselves with laughter, and wind up on the floor, closer to their fire. Once they’ve calmed down a bit more, Tallulah raises her own canteen to the sky in a toast.  
“To absent friends and seven hundred more years.”  
“Absent friends and seven hundred more years” Arcturus and Raven echo, as all three of them take a drink.

They keep swapping stories for hours afterwards, thinking back to the old days when the original Fireteam: Endymion had all been alive and well; Cayde and Andal getting into innumerable scrapes, Angélé tuning her sparrow for every environment they passed through, and Arcturus takes a great deal of glee in reminding his two old friends how their courtship began.  
“I still remember your first kiss” he says with a wide grin, and then Raven pulls her cloak over her eyes and Tallulah goes uncharacteristically red.

“Oh Tallulah~!” he imitates in a high warbly voice, “If we don’t make it out of here, I need to know just once-” what little he can see of Raven’s cheeks under her pulled down hood are a brighter red than the eye of any Vex on Venus, and Tallulah isn’t far off either.  
“Like you were any less sappy.” Tallulah grumbles at him and Arcturus laughs.  
“Can’t deny that.” He feels a phantom ache for a cigarette in his fingers for a long moment before he shakes it off and changes the subject.  
“We have to stay on planet while everyone else finishes, right?”  
“Procedure” Tallulah nods at him, and Arcturus rises from his comfortable slump against the rock with a groan.  
“Shall I take first watch?”

It’s not really a question, he’s offering to give the couple some time alone, not least because he wants some time alone with the inside of his own head.  
“Sure” Raven answers for them both, and he’s so grateful for how long he’s known them.  
He picks the tallest, nearest tree and starts climbing, punching hand-holds into the bark as he gets higher and higher until at last he breaks through the main tree canopy and realises that he left his helmet on the ground. But there’s nothing he can do about that, so he just pulls his hood up to shield against the remnants of the storm and has Callahan route his ship’s satellite imaging data into his rifle scope and his basic remaining HUD.

He spends a few hours up there with nothing but the thoughts in his head, the void in his veins, and the memory of Angélé in his head until Tallulah climbs up to his perch to relieve him with a thanks.

He makes it down the tree and sits back down to find Raven weaving a strange little ribbon of thread, loaded with Hunter’s marks. On closer inspection, he realises they’re Endymion’s, Tallulah’s Snake, Raven’s crescent moon, Arcturus’ own Arrow, Angélé’s feather, Andal’s lightning bolt, Cayde’s flaming spade.  
“Novel use for old marks” he comments and she looks up with a smile.  
“Yeah, I figured none of us need each-other’s, and it’s a nice memento, considering what we’re walking into…”  
“...and what we’ve walked away from” Arcturus completes her sentence with a wry, muted smile. Raven nods.  
“You want one? I don’t have multiple copies of any of them and I already did Lully’s.”  
“Yeah, please” he tells her, digging out his own marks while she finishes up her own and then handing them off as she starts on his.

A few minutes later, the silence is weighing, and as Raven is starting to thread the marks into the weave, following a rhythm Arcturus knows very well, she asks her friend a question.  
“Where were you during the Red War? Lully and I were worried about you, we didn’t hear anything on the Endymion channel until we got our light back.” Arcturus smiles a genuine smile at Raven’s nickname for her wife, the one she’ll only use in private or around very close friends, that only Raven and no-one else can use without having to be resurrected by their Ghost a minute later.  
“I went to ground hard in the EDZ” Arcturus replies, “there were rumours of multiple guardians getting their light back from the shard of the Traveller, so I went there for mine...” he trails off and Raven cocks her head as she weaves her next mark into the thread;  
“And…?”

Solemnly, Arcturus pulls out the draw-string bag full of Nevicata’s broken remains in silent answer.  
“It almost worked” he says, hollowly, “the light even reacted, but in the end… nothing.” he stows the bag again and Raven nods in silent understanding. Arcturus gives a half shrug and stows the bag again. “I did get something though, not much, but it felt like her.” Raven cocks her head and Arcturus holds out his hand and lets a single spark of Arc energy play around his splayed fingers, one of Angélé’s favourite tricks. Raven’s mouth drops into a surprised “o” for a second and hangs there before Arcturus pulls his hand back and summons a dusk arrow to twirl on his fingers as Raven’s open mouth turns into a genuine smile and she weaves the last mark onto the thread before she ties it off and leans over to place it around his neck, which swiftly turns into a hug that Arcturus gladly reciprocates as he dismisses his arrow.

“Siblings in the Void, always” she murmurs in his ear and Arcturus can feel the trace of a traitorous tear leaking down her cheek and his own.  
“Siblings in the Void” he affirms, before their embrace breaks and Raven places her own woven necklace of marks around her neck before she goes to relieve Tallulah of watch duty.

Tallulah descends the tree a fair while later with a look on her face stuck halfway between murderous rage and sympathy that has Arcturus standing up and backing off as she strides up to him.  
“You made my Raven cry” she jabs a finger into his chest and towers over him, and Arcturus winces because Tallulah is two inches taller even than him and she’s scary as hell, but then she wraps him in a hug and it’s all he can do to reciprocate.  
“I’m so sorry we weren’t there.” she says quietly and Arcturus shakes his head and sits down as she moves away.  
“It’s not your fault Tallu.” She looks him up and down critically, but he continues. “Your top priority was each other in that mess, I wouldn’t forgive you if it wasn’t. Just like I know if situations were reversed you wouldn’t ever forgive me for not choosing her.” She nods at that.  
“That’s fair, but still; with what we’re walking into right now,” she gestures around them vaguely and Arcturus nods as she continues, “Endymion stays together, if war footing goes to rout, we exit together this time.”

“You’ll never be without me” Arcturus promises, “but I may bring some new family.”  
“As might we,” Tallulah shrugs, “but however this one goes, we three go out of it together, because let’s face it, it might end up going really really bad this time.”  
“I thought my lot were supposed to be the real pessimists.” Arcturus says, snarky but without edge, and Tallulah laughs.  
“I married the only Nightstalker who’s a ray of sunshine, one of us has to be a realist.” That makes Arcturus laugh, and then Tallulah’s ghost gives a little ping to tell her the last Hunters on planet are done with their maps and they can move out.  
“Thank you Artemis” she says, before whistling up the tree.

Not ten seconds later Raven falls into the camp and arrests herself with a jump off bare air a microsecond before she hits the ground. Causing a rush of air that extinguishes their fire when she does. It’s a move that takes Arcturus back in time for a brief second, so he smiles, stows his helmet, gathers everything and waits for his orders.  
“We’re finally kicking this rock” Tallulah tells them both with relish and Raven cottons on to the expanded use of “we” immediately.  
“We’re leaving together?”  
“Of course” Tallulah tells her, updating their active listing in Vanguard logs as the old and venerable Endymion channel pops up on the top of the list in Arcturus’ HUD with a reactivated status light, six users, three active, and three they never had the heart to remove.

Arcturus sees his status in the No Respect For Our Elder fireteam channel move from “active: on assignment” to “dormant: reassigned priority” and Callahan sends along a single message to explain the change.  
“Where are the Hunters off to boss?” he asks Tallulah as they stand ready, before Commander Zavala’s reassignment shows up for them all.  
“Earth?” Tallulah sounds confused as she reads off the location before it clears and she finishes their portion of the short briefing; “Endymion assignment: North American/Canadian border wilderness full scan and clear.” Raven visibly deflates at the coming tedium and Arcturus follows suit.  
“Our own reputation for thoroughness working against us there I see.” he gumbles, Tallulah nods in resigned agreement and takes a deep breath before she perks up and slings an arm around them both.  
“No-one I’d rather spend the time with.” Arcturus feels his new woven necklace of marks pressing against his heart under his armour and smiles in agreement.  
“You riding with us?” Raven asks and Arcturus raises an eyebrow.  
“Still running the Drachma?”  
“I’d never give it up, your room is still open.”  
“Then I never really left.”

The familiar pull of transmat takes them all over, and a moment later they’re standing in the Drachma as if they’d never left all those years ago, and Arcturus can’t help the wide smile that breaks across his face as Callahan removes his helmet from under his arm and keeps it in the ether.  
“Make ready for the off” Tallulah tells them without looking back as she walks up to the door leading to the cockpit and the rest of the ship; and through the window Arcturus sees his own ship entering NLS on autopilot back to the tower and all he can think of is that he’s finally home.

**Author's Note:**

> Not super proud of the ending but I'm a bad writer so hopefully I get better with time.


End file.
